Funeral Directing
When Death Hits the Professional
© 2011 Chris Baranski, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio
Today’s guest post is written by Pastor Dieter Reda:
Death has been called he great equalizer. Kings and paupers and everyone in between must die. That includes preachers and post mortem health care professionals (a.k.a. Funeral Directors). Not only must we all die eventually, but before that we also must deal with the death of one or more people that we love. And then what do we do? Do we call on another professional to serve us, or do we show how competent we are and do it ourselves?
I once knew a Funeral Director who embalmed his mother. He said it was his way of grieving, and “the last thing I could do for her”. I found that to be creepy, but who am I to judge. As a pastor I have literally “heard it all” and that was part of it.
In January of 2010 I officiated at the funeral of my mother. I know there are two schools of thought about that topic too, so let me explain. My mother was, as most good mothers are, very proud of her son . She was hugely supportive of my decision to enter the ministry, and a tremendous encouragement and support along the way. In fact one of my more difficult pastoral assignments was a church in my home town. Mom and Dad transferred their membership to that small congregation. Their desire to support their son was stronger than the desire to have a great pastor. You see, | was young, and most young professionals (in any profession) know it all. But I digress. In the time that we lived in close proximity, Mom had witnessed several funerals that I conducted, and there were a few others that she and I attended together. She would offer her commentary, which when considered together could be regarded as her final wishes. Whenever she saw a casket that she didn’t like, she would say, “don’t you dare put me in something like that”. So we didn’t. She told me more than once that she did not wish to be cremated. I assured her that we would remember to honour her wishes. And then there was a certain funeral hymn that she heard once too often. “I don’t want that sung at my funeral”. And so we didn’t. However I wasn’t above using the offensive song in a service while she was still alive. I deliberately tried to make eye contact to see which of us would lose our straight face. Her head was buried in her hymnal and i endured a hailstorm at lunch. And then came the day, with the quiet request, spoken only once, “I want you to bury me.” I said that though this is a hard request, I would do my best.
The day of her funeral came. My message was prepared. The service was led by her pastor in the church where she worshipped. The pastoral staff there had helped to plan the service, and I was glad that they were in charge. The parts that we had agreed that I would lead would be a message, as well as leading the graveside service. I know that only God could give me the strength for that difficult task. Surprisingly, someone asked me shortly after the service how I could do such a thing dry-eyed. I assured the person that I had done more than my share of crying before the service, and that there will surely be more to come. Funny isn’t it, how there is always someone who thinks they know how something could be done better?
The other school of thought on this matter is, that if one is a professional like a pastor or funeral director, one should focus on just being a son or whatever, and allow others to do the heavy lifting of the funeral. In other words: grieve, and allow people to serve you rather than having to always serve others others. There is wisdom to that, and I don’t think that I am some kind of exception. We found a way to do both: to honour my mother’s wishes and at the same time allowing her pastors to do the pastoral work. During the funeral I did not sit on the platform with the other clergy, but sat in the pew with my family, and I soaked up everything that the other pastors said and did. While she was dying, I behaved totally like a son, and not a pastor. I had stood or sat at scores of deathbeds and helped people cross the valley of the shadow, but for my mother I couldn’t do it. I am thankful for her pastors who gave her what she needed, and who came to her bedside and gave us what we needed, right after she died.
The bottom line: as professionals we are no less human than anyone else. Losing a loved one hurts, and the fact that you are a professional who deals with death day in and day out will not protect you from that pain. So don’t pretend that it does. If you are a funeral director, you will need a funeral director at that time, and if you are a pastor, you will need a pastor. That doesn’t mean that you can’t be involved with your special gifts and expertise. That can be both therapeutic and honouring to your loved one.
It has been 5 years since Mom has been gone. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of her. Sometimes, without thinking, I reach for the phone to call her, and then reality sets in once again. But looking back on it, I am glad that I did exactly what Mom wanted, both in terms of my own involvement as well as every other aspect of her funeral. My Dad saw how difficult it was, so he told me that he would not be making the request that Mom did. However, I know that I will do for him what I did for her. Now that he is 89 and suffering from cancer, that day is drawing closer, but I know I will find the strength when the time comes.
Dieter Reda has been an ordained Minister for the past 34 years and served various churches in central and western Canada. Since 2003 he is senior pastor at Mission Baptist Church in Hamilton, Ontario (Canada). His blog of pastoral musings on various issues is at www.dieterreda.com and you can follow him on Twitter @Dieterreda.
10 Reasons You MUST Have a Funeral
© 2013 Justin Dolske, Flickr | CC-BY-SA | via Wylio
Many people tell me “I don’t want a funeral. Just burn my ass and throw me in the woods.”
But funerals are both much deeper, much more important and much broader than most of us assume. They’re neither “just for the living” nor must they be the traditional viewing, priest, eulogy and funeral director format (although none of these things are bad … especially the funeral director *wink* *wink*). Funerals can be both deeply spiritual events and celebrations mixed with music, poetry and beauty.
Here are 10 things that give funerals both a deep and broad sense of meaning and value:
Individual Celebration / Mourning
The internet/Facebook/TV give us so many amazing stories. And the negative is that they give us so many stories! It’s like a smorgasbord of narratives and it’s easy for the individual to get lost among the celebrities, the pop sensations, the stars and the pro athletes. But it’s the individuals that make our community run and their stories get overshadowed … except at funerals, when we can rope off the smorgasbord, turn down the volume, ignore Kim Kardashian’s latest stunt, turn our cell phones off and celebrate and mourn one life.
Hope infusion
Sigmund Freud stated that you have two choices: accept death or deny death. Freud also believed that religion was often a neurotic attempt to deny the reality of death. And, to some degree he’s right. But, when we look for hope, when we look for transcendence and when we look for immortality in the face of death, it doesn’t always fit into Freud’s binaries … it’s possible to accept death through some form of hopeful transcendent understanding of death.
Whether that hope is in heaven, or in the continuation of the deceased’s family or a more natural (i.e. green burial) type of orientation, or all of the above, it’s important that we find hope through the message of a funeral. Hope is what gives a funeral special meaning that helps us rise from the pits of darkness.
Value Affirmation
Death creates a hole in our lives and our world. It’s like an earthquake that shakes the world we once knew. Funerals are a time when we can reaffirm meaning, love, community, goodness and even humor. They allow us a space to come together and affirm that life is changed, but it still continues on. Funerals are a storytelling practice that keeps the identity of our family alive even when one of our members has died.
Drunk Eulogies
In my many years as a funeral director, there are few things that are more gratifyingly awkward and entertaining than a spontaneous drunk eulogy. Someday I’ll video one of these events, lawyer up and put it on YouTube.
Human dignity
To deny a person a funeral is to deny them an act of dignity.
Tony Walter writes “(funerals) mark that something valuable, a human life, has passed. Whatever else a funeral does or does not do, it must do this.”
This explains why so often impoverished and/or marginalized peoples will spend proportionately exorbitant amounts of money and time on the funerals of family and friends. They have been so devalued in life, that the funeral acts as one final statement of dignity. On the other hand, in a culture like the West — where we sit in social hegemony – we see less need for the dignity of a funeral; thus direct cremation, direct burial, etc..
Public acknowledgement of life and death
We like things to be private. And there’s good reason. Being public with our opinions, our religious values and even our sports teams get’s messy. But if we live in community, we die in community. And funerals give the community a time to come together an grieve, because …
Grief shared is grief diminished
The more we can share our grief, the more we can allow others to reach out to us, the more we allow ourselves to be vulnerable and accept help and love, the healthier we can walk through our bereavement.
Transition
On a psychological level, funerals and disposition (especially when the body is present), help us to see and accept death. Without a funeral that acknowledges the death of our loved ones, the dead can too easily become psychological ghosts. Funerals transition the deceased from alive to dead, and help us on the path to accepting the death of a loved one.
Ritual
The walls of bereavement are very intimidating to even the spiritually and psychologically strong. It doesn’t matter how strong you are, you will fall and you will fail.
Unless you enter through the trodden paths of ritual.
The muscle memory of grief is ritual. Like the masterful pianist who makes impossible tasks seem natural, so ritual allows us to take the incredibly difficult task of mourning and gives us a way to persevere, even when it seems we shouldn’t.
Free food from post funeral luncheon
Aunt Eunice’s special potato salad. Uncle Bob’s homemade mead. Grandma’s collard greens. Good Lord. Pass the baked beans.
10 MUSTS for EVERY Ethical Funeral Professional
1. Strict adherence to The Funeral Rule. Obv.
2. Guide families to choose financially responsible funerals that won’t make them “funeral poor”.
3. Educate families in alternative options even if those options are detrimental to the bottom line.
4. Always choose transparency and disclosure over secrecy and intention omission.
5. Make sure every choice the family makes is completely theirs sans sales pressure.
6. Integrity is doing what’s right when nobody is looking. Ethical funeral directors always practice integrity.
7. Never encourage families to purchase out of guilt, or equate love of the deceased with a high priced funeral.
8. Never put yourself or the business in a financially strenuously situation where you might be tempted to overprice your service and merchandise.
9. Practice responsible self-care to avoid burnout and compassion fatigue.
10. Know your knowledge boundaries. Direct those questions outside our professional knowledge to the people who are qualified to answer. We aren’t lawyers, doctors, grief counselors or theologians.
“I don’t want to see her body!”
© 2009 Don LaVange, Flickr | CC-BY-SA | via Wylio
“I can’t, I can’t!” screams the 30 year old mother of two
with trembling body and clouded mind.
Her grandmother, once familiar, now foreign.
Hands cold, lips shut.
Eyes closed with glue.
A body that once embodied love
now fear.
Once comfort, now pain.
Her parents urge her again . . .
“I don’t want to see her!”
The protestations echo though the walls and down to our bones
“What’s going on?” “WHATS GOING ON?!”
asks the protester’s two year old daughter.
Her small voice isn’t lost in the noise.
Her four-year-old brother quickly hugs her
and whispers
“It’s okay”
She finds calm in his arms.
I listen.
I watch.
Waiting.
The stampede of grief settles like dust.
The two year old drops her crackers on the floor.
Her protesting mother picks them up one by one
“Let me throw them out.” I say.
“You never know what kind of germs are on a funeral home floor.”
The humor finds a small crack
that allows laughter instead of tears.
A kind word and a touch of humor.
A moment later, she straightens her back.
Wipes her face.
Grabs the hands of her children
She walks to the casket.
Nine Benefits of Hiring a Funeral Director
© 2014 Raina Gauthier, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio
There’s a lot of “death hacks” and DIY options that all but eliminate the need for a funeral director. But, this doesn’t mean funeral directors are outdated and unneeded. Like taxes, wedding planning, buying a house or even giving birth, there’s a range of symbiotic DIY options and professional involvement. While it’s usually possible to have a DIY funeral, funeral directors are beneficial during the death process.
Here are nine benefits to hiring a funeral director:
1. Documents, Applications, Paperwork, etc.
We’re kind of pros at this stuff. From death certificates to burial permits, to military marker applications to Social Security reporting, we can fill them out like Brian Williams can make up war stories.
2. Good hugs.
I’d like to believe I give some of the best hugs. I’ve probably hugged more people than Hugh Heffner has slept with (okay, that might be an exaggeration). I’ve perfected my squeeze, my hold length (not too longer and not too short) and I know the right time to give a little kiss on the cheek. Yes, we give hugs to people who don’t hire us, but we give more hugs to the people that do.
3. Logistical Stress Relief.
When my wife and I got married we were young and situated in the poverty bracket. Our wedding was put together by the good will of our family and friends. We — my wife and I — did much of the logistical and orderly work ourselves before and during our wedding day. It’s hard to look back at our wedding and say, “Oh yeah, we had a blast” because we were the one’s pulling together the last minute details and making sure the wedding orchestration was on point.
Weddings are stressful. So are funerals. To have a wedding planner would have helped the joy of our wedding day. To have a funeral director can often help the grief of death.
4. Stable Minds for Unstable Souls.
I don’t really like the term “funeral director” because I believe our role should be less directing and more guiding. We can do either, but our experience, the fact that “we’ve done this” a lot allows us to provide you with a stability reference point when you’re at your most unstable moment. In some sense, we are like hiking guides. We can help you trek through some of the stages of a foreign environment.
5. Reference Gold Mine.
We know people. Pastors. Celebrants. Insurance Companies. Estate lawyers. Newspaper contacts. Flower shops. Funeral catering companies. Bagpipers. Organists. Irish Dancers. Bar tenders. VA Benefits Personnel.
6. At Need Attention.
When a death in your family occurs, your mind can become a crazy whirlwind of thoughts and feelings. Rarely do those thoughts and feelings pop into your mind in a nice orderly fashion. They come early in the morning, late at night, etc. and we’re there — usually a phone call away — from helping within our capacity.
7. Product Availability.
Yes, Walmart sells caskets. But we’re like the Walmart of funeral products: we’re that one stop shop for all things funeral. And if we don’t have the urn or casket or thing you’re looking for, we usually have the connections to those who do.
8. Back Rubs.
The code phrase is “Grin Reaper”. If you say that phrase to any funeral director, we’ll be obligated to give you a back rub that will rid your body of grief pain.
9. Embalming.
If funeral directors think embalming is the very best we have to offer the grieving masses, we’re missing out on our true potential.
But, with that said, when a death is tragic and the body has been disfigured and there’s a desire to see the deceased in a less disfigured state, embalming and restorative art offer a real value to the bereaved that only we can provide.
